


your heart is a muscle

by anons



Category: SEVENTEEN (Band)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-17
Updated: 2021-03-17
Packaged: 2021-03-26 06:34:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,370
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30101784
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anons/pseuds/anons
Summary: Soonyoung refuses to give Wonwoo's heart back.
Relationships: Jeon Wonwoo/Kwon Soonyoung | Hoshi
Comments: 22
Kudos: 43





	your heart is a muscle

Bandages don’t cut it, obviously. By the third hour his carpet’s a striking landscape of blood that makes him want to throw up. He’s probably gonna taste the tang of it for days. That is, when he makes it. If he makes it. He’s feeling dangerously lightheaded even though he’s been lying on the floor for hours instead of standing up. This, he supposes, is normal. You know, especially since there’s a gaping hole on the left of his chest where his heart should be. He should be dead and maybe he is dead. Maybe this is his own personal hell. Maybe the afterlife means bleeding out on the bedroom floor and thinking of your best friend who probably has your heart displayed in his room like a prize. Wonwoo wonders how many he’s stolen and how many he’s kept and if Wonwoo’s heart even means anything to him at all.

He shudders, eyes shutting close, and if this is his last breath then let it be a whisper of Soonyoung’s name.

Wonwoo knows him. He has for a decade already. If he had to think of a description for Soonyoung, it’d be full of superlatives. The most golden grin, the biggest heart, the most tenacious person he knows with the persistence of an aching bruise. Every day Soonyoung wakes up, fills his stomach, goes to the studio to burn everything off, and then goes to the gym to burn some more. Wonwoo’s schedule is identical to his most times so meeting him’s not a trouble. Finding him is easy but actually seeing him is hard.

It goes a little bit like this:

“Soonyoung,” he says.

“Wonwoo,” Soonyoung says back, smiling beautifully, and Wonwoo feels blood clot in his tongue.

The elevator doors shut close and voices ring from the hallway. “Give it back,” he breathes.

“Give what back?”

“You know what you did,” he says, and Soonyoung just stares at him cleanly. “I can’t function like this, Soonyoung. It’s going to affect my entire system and my performance and—and it’s going to affect the entire team. You can’t keep it. It’s not yours. You have to give it back.”

Soonyoung leans in. “Or what?”

His gaze undoes the seams of Wonwoo’s chest, stitch by stitch by stitch. If Wonwoo still had his heart, he’d feel it pound against his ribs like a fist as Soonyoung comes impossibly close. 

He shuts his eyes and whispers, “Or I’ll have no choice but to take it from you.” 

Soonyoung laughs. “You won’t.”

“I will.”

“You could, but you won’t.” When Wonwoo opens his eyes, Soonyoung’s backed up a safe distance, and he feels himself release a breath. “It’s not like you have the ability to even if you try, anyway. I kept it in a safe place where no one else but me could get to.” He smiles. “It’s mine now.”

“I told you, it’s not yours, my heart doesn’t belong to you.” 

There’s a playful glimmer in Soonyoung’s eyes. “Are you sure?”

“Stop playing games with me,” Wonwoo says desperately. 

“I’m not.”

“Soonyoung.”

“I’m really not,” he says, gaze sharpening. “You’re the one playing games. I said I kept it in a safe place, didn’t I? Why don’t you trust me with it?”

“Because you stole it.”

“You allowed me to.” 

Wonwoo swallows, and Soonyoung raises an eyebrow at him.

“Go ahead,” Soonyoung says, challenging, “Tell me I’m wrong. Tell me you don’t want this too.” 

He can’t find it in him to tell the truth. Even to him, his own voice sounds weak. “Give it back.”

Soonyoung shakes his head, and the elevator dings as it arrives on the ground floor. “I can’t,” he says. 

The doors open to reveal the rest of the team waiting. Soonyoung looks away first and steps out, leaving him. Jeonghan, god-equivalent, ever the perceptive one, looks between them and asks: “Did you two fight or something?” 

Wonwoo steps out too, chest gaping like an abyss. “Don’t worry about it, hyung.”

How it happened wasn’t a hallmark card event. There was nothing particularly noteworthy about the realization or the moment or the day when Wonwoo had his heart stolen. It was just a quick run to the convenience store with one of their managers for two boxes of milk. It wasn’t the way the yolky store lights shone down on Soonyoung’s face or the close proximity of their heads as they picked out milk brands or the warm crinkle of Soonyoung’s eyes when Wonwoo blurted out an offhand joke. He hadn’t even realized it happened until it did. He leaves the dorm with a heart and comes home without one. By the time the car’s parked and the milk boxes are deposited in the fridge and Wonwoo’s in the bathroom to wash his hands, the entire dorm floor is littered with his blood. When he looks at the mirror, the other half of his rib’s smashed open to reveal a murder-red crevice where his heart is supposed to be. 

“That’s not how it’s supposed to work,” Wonwoo whispers to Soonyoung in the half-asleep car after their little scuffle in the elevator. “You’re only supposed to take half of it, not the entire thing.”

Soonyoung snorts, lips lifting in bland amusement. “No, I’m not.”

“Yes, you are.” 

“You want me to cut your heart in half and hurt you in the process?”

Wonwoo side-eyes a spaced out Hansol and turns back to Soonyoung. “Well that’s better than having no heart at all,” he whispers a bit furiously.

“Oh Wonwoo,” Soonyoung sighs, resting his head on the back of the car seat and closing his eyes. “You don’t understand it at all.”

Wonwoo stares at it.

Soonyoung raises an eyebrow. “Are you just going to look at it?” 

He looks at Soonyoung’s hand swimming in blood and the beating muscle on his palm. “What are you doing?” he asks incredulously.

“Damn,” Soonyoung huffs, “Thought we talked about this earlier. You said you needed a heart and I’m giving it to you so you stop complaining about having none.”

He blinks wildly. “That’s not mine.”

“Great deduction, Sherlock, anything else you wanna point out?”

“That’s—” he swallows, looking at the gaping hole on Soonyoung’s chest, identical to his own, “That’s yours.” 

Soonyoung proffers the heart a bit more forcefully. “Just take it, Wonwoo.”

“I—I don’t understand.” 

“What’s there to not understand? I’m standing in front of you, bloody and offering my entire heart. Do you need more clues? Do you perhaps need a big sign spelling out what I’m trying to say?”

Wonwoo feels his thoughts float. “When I said I needed a heart I didn’t—”

Soonyoung looks wounded. “Are you rejecting me?”

“No, no,” he says hastily, stepping closer to prove a point, and Soonyoung eyes him warily. “I’m not, really. I was gonna say I didn’t expect any of this to happen.” He swallows nervously. “But just because I didn’t expect this doesn’t mean I don’t want it to happen.”

Soonyoung looks away. “Just take it.”

“Thank you,” he says, accepting, holding Soonyoung’s heart carefully like it was the most precious thing in the world. And maybe it is, to Wonwoo. “Where’s mine?” 

“Safe with me,” Soonyoung murmurs. “Don’t worry about it.” 

“I’m not.”

He allows a tiny, amused smile. “Do you really think just taking half of your heart would be easier?” 

“Hey, it’s what people say!”

“Stupid,” he chuckles, and Wonwoo stares at him in wild fascination. “That’s not how it works. That would mean breaking it and I don’t want that.” Soonyoung looks at him with sure eyes. “I want all of you or nothing at all.”

Wonwoo holds Soonyoung’s heart in his hand. “You have all of me now.”

Jeonghan rides with them on the elevator down. He blinks at Soonyoung and Wonwoo and scoffs, a small, lopsided smile playing on his lips as he stands beside them. Seungcheol joins them just before the door closes and raises an eyebrow at Jeonghan’s amused face.

“What’s so funny?” he asks.

“Nothing,” Jeonghan says, and starts humming a tune suspiciously similar to the wedding march under his breath. Soonyoung nudges an elbow to his rib. The elevator door closes and they descend.

**Author's Note:**

> not tagged magical realism bec it depends if you want to take the stolen heart literally or not


End file.
